


Hypothetical

by echoinautumn (maybetwice)



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Coffee, First Date, M/M, Military, What-If, Workplace Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-07
Updated: 2012-12-07
Packaged: 2017-11-20 13:28:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/585863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maybetwice/pseuds/echoinautumn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sulu just wants an hour to find out what they could be, if only business as usual could be something a little lighter on the intergalactic heroics.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hypothetical

**Author's Note:**

  * For [live_with_love](https://archiveofourown.org/users/live_with_love/gifts).



> Thanks to a full minute of Trek preview to violently shake off a solid year-and-a-half-plus of writer's block, and a prompt live_with_love gave me several months ago, this happened. I missed you guys!

The work of a Starfleet lieutenant is thankless, Sulu thinks when he’s cleared for transport with the rest of the landing party. He’s had plenty of time to rethink his naïve reasoning for joining up while negotiating peace with the rebel forces on Gorlan over the last nine days; time which was spent dodging disruptor fire from both sides to deliver demands preceding the ceasefire. Now that the gritty part of negotiating peace is done, of course, Kirk will take over the accords on board the _Enterprise_. Sulu and his team will receive some kind of cheap-feeling commendation that he’d trade without blinking for a week of shore leave and a whole meal without a glimpse of combat rations. A look at the rest of them suggests that they feel about the same. Crewman Zth’ala is half asleep already and Chekov, the only other officer who accompanied the mission, looks mutinous on the other end of the group. 

It’s late by all measures of the word when they rematerialize on the transporter pad, sometime during gamma shift, at least, but Spock will run them through the debriefing protocol all the same, though they are each battered and sleepless. As expected, Spock is waiting next to the transporter console with Kyle, who looks unenthused by his own existence at 2344 ship’s time. Sulu can’t blame him; transporting the landing party back to the ship is likely to be the most exciting thing he’ll be doing on this particular shift. Late night transport duty is, as far as Sulu understands from shore leave with Scotty, usually the sort of thing that’s determined among the Engineering crew by games of cards and Academy-style drinking games. 

Sulu is the last off the pad, after the rest of the party shuffles into the debriefing room. He does feel a wash of gratitude for whichever Starfleet engineer of yore developed the auto-decontamination screening for the transporter. The mere thought of undergoing a thorough medical decontamination, even though he’s never had to outside basic training, is depressing. 

Spock has already taken a seat at the head of the long table in the debriefing room when the door locks behind Sulu and he slides into the chair next to Chekov, whose mood seems to roll off him in waves of irritable discontent, entirely oblivious to the comedy of his youthful face pulled tight with anger. If Sulu didn’t know any better, and if Spock weren’t watching with an unnervingly calm and alert expression, he might laugh. 

The hazy exhaustion clinging to every pore and tightening every muscle in Sulu’s body has one merciful effect in rendering time obsolete for the half-hour debriefing. Spock looks noticeably ruffled by his monosyllabic answers, the kind which communicate very little of value. But what was there to say, really: no one was seriously injured, otherwise someone from Medical would have come to treat them before their meeting, but no one comes, and no one needs to. 

Spock stands and picks up his datapadd, nodding to the group to dismiss them. Sulu musters a tired salute and has to elbow Chekov into the same, but at least Chekov now looks as if he’ll fall asleep rather than punch anyone who says anything to him. Even Spock avoided asking him anything of any great importance, directing all his questions to Sulu and the petty officer in command of the infantry squad that had composed most of the party.

“A commendable accomplishment, Lieutenant.” Spock tucks his hands behind his back and gestures for Sulu to leave first, which he only does after grabbing Chekov’s elbow and steering him out as well. 

“Aye, sir,” he answers automatically. “And, all due respect, but I’ll be just as glad to see someone else go next time.” 

Spock’s eyebrows jump, and Sulu imagines a phantom smile twitching at the corners of his mouth when Chekov trips through the hatch and staggers back into Sulu. His shoulder is sharp and Sulu will have another bruise to accompany the rest of the marks on his body, but he catches Chekov easily and offers his friend a thin smile. He’ll have to remember to talk to him after they’ve rested, because Chekov is as commendable as he is, even as the junior mission officer. Perhaps also because Sulu has been meaning to ask him for months whether he wants to spend more time together off-shift, playing zero-grav racquetball or strategy games or just having a cup of coffee so he can take in a little more of Chekov. Sulu likes that Chekov’s expression pinches tight when he concentrates on explaining something he’s passionate about, and his clumsy accent has softened on Sulu’s ears to a pleasant rhythm whenever they catch one another off-shift, or even when Chekov reports coordinates when he’s at the helm and they work in what approaches near-perfect tandem the longer they have to get to know one another. Why wouldn’t he want to learn more about him?

When Spock clears his throat to speak again, Sulu is the one who trips over the hatch. Chekov looks through heavy lids at him and even his irritable expression loses some of its vitriol when he steadies Sulu’s arm in turn.

“Mr. Sulu, I will recommend your entire team for a day to recuperate before returning to your regular duties.” Spock’s voice lilts slightly off-key and he seems to float into the corridor, leaving Sulu with Chekov leaning bodily against him and the distinct impression that he had not, in fact, imagined Spock’s sense of humor.

After depositing Chekov into the quarters he shares with an intelligence scouting ensign who opens the door with a muffled grunt before dropping back into his bunk, Sulu thinks to find him in the mess the following day for the conversation he’s been meaning to have with him. It isn’t really a bad idea, since they are supposed to have the day off and they are on the same shift schedule with the rest of the alpha shift bridge crew. 

But Sulu should know better by now than to place any hope in even the best-laid of plans. 

A small group of the rebel Gorlans break the ceasefire by launching an attack on the government satellite defense systems. A klaxon and a direct order through his commbadge from Kirk himself drives Sulu from the rec room and back to the transporter, where he can join the group of security officers deploying from the _Enterprise_ to defend the satellite network. The most critical aspect of the Federaton’s role as mediators was to intervene in such circumstances, Spock reminds Sulu from the door of the briefing room as he suits up. 

It isn’t hard fighting, but it still takes hours to clear each of the satellites and secure the ceasefire again once the rebel leadership denounced the attack as a group of rogues acting on their own. Sulu spends an hour and a half waiting for an official missive to deliver to a Gorlan envoy waiting aboard the _Enterprise_. When he does, the alien gives him a withering glance over which suggests nothing but contempt for the state of his suit, which is black with disruptor burns. From the end of the table, Kirk gives him a thumbs-up and a huge grin, and Sulu has to remind himself that saluting a superior officer is Starfleet protocol; doubly so when standing before the delegation of one half of tenuous peace negotiations. 

He doesn’t even see Chekov when he stalks out into the corridor, or hear him when he hoarsely shouts for him by rank. 

It isn’t until the lanky ensign catches up to him and grabs his shoulder that Sulu notices him at all and jumps a few inches away. Chekov does the same, as if simultaneously realizing that for all their friendly chatter and camaraderie, Sulu is still his superior officer and appropriate procedure for getting the attention of such an officer typically excludes bodily force.

“Lieutenant,” Chekov mumbles, his eyes directed somewhere around Sulu’s sooty knees. “I called for you, sir. Someone was sent to the medical bay, and I heard you were sent to disrupt the attack. I’m glad to see you’re safe, sir.”

Sulu waves a hand dismissively and shakes his head, recognizing his gloves on his hands and thinking absently of the things that have yet to be done, such as the return of his equipment to the armory, leftover mission paperwork from the landing mission on Gorlan, and still more paperwork he hasn’t even begun for this particular attack. 

“It’s fine, Chekov,” he says absently and shakes his head when Chekov looks up at him with a quizzical expression. He’s stammering now, losing hold of his jumbled thoughts, except the creeping impression that he’s missing something. 

“I mean _I’m_ fine. I’m fine, thanks for asking. Excuse me.”

Four hours later, as Sulu is tapping his personnel code into his console to sign off on the Gorlan paperwork, it finally occurs to him that the thing bothering him, the thing he’s forgotten, has nothing to do with work, and everything to do with the flummoxed expression on Chekov’s face when he had brushed past him in a distracted flurry. 

_Oh_ , Sulu thinks and lays his forehead on the console until it shrieks its protest.

*

Sulu can remember a time when he loved his job with a thrilling passion that kept him going through whatever Starfleet put him through. Even with Nero, or any of the other goings-on too heavy to carry in his heart every day, Sulu had found deep, resounding joy in his work on the _Enterprise_ , his fingers on her controls as her pilot, or late nights in the botany and physics labs, sometimes with Chekov and sometimes entirely on his own, surrounded with the things he loves the most in life.

In a way that shouldn’t be possible, it’s certainly not logical, Sulu loves his job. But for the following week, the ship is absorbed with the Gorlan peace accords and he finds it immeasurably more difficult to love it. 

Sulu spends hours on the bridge with Chekov maintaining a holding pattern over the planet and never saying a word beyond the typical litany of commands while Kirk is off the bridge managing diplomatic negotiations and he has the conn. After shifts, one or both of them are called off to various other duties on the planet itself, or in the labs, or Engineering, and Sulu hasn’t been able to catch Chekov for a conversation about anything other than thruster intensity and course charting, let alone to apologize for the misunderstanding in the corridor. 

There’s something more than the miscommunication, too. Sulu is too old for crushes, particularly on junior officers he’s not supposed to even think about out of uniform, but Chekov is bright and competent, brash and fun to be around, and Kirk generally encourages his crew to spend time together, despite military regulation. There’s even been an implicit expectation that more than a few of them are going to end up doing a great deal more than playing a few rounds of three-dimensional chess together. Not that Sulu necessarily thinks that’s what will happen if he spends any more time around Chekov, but it’s something he thinks about periodically; the hypothetical what-ifs of life that fill the empty space in his mind. He doesn’t dwell on them, not usually, but it’s easy to indulge them when spending long, silent hours next to Chekov piloting the _Enterprise_ in a slow holding pattern. 

If only he could catch Chekov long enough to talk again. Chekov surely knows him well enough to tell that he was only tired, distracted by the duties left undone and not irritated by his concern. The more Sulu allows himself to think about it, the more intriguing he finds the whole thing and the more certain he is that Chekov is as frustrated by the unrelenting parade of duties that require their individual attention and no one else’s. 

Chekov hovers by the helm at the start of beta shift on the eleventh day of the Gorlan negotiations, quietly detailing a few course corrections to the relief navigator, who is merely nodding along to Chekov’s perfunctory explanation. Sulu is halfway to the turbolift when he looks back over his shoulder and finds Chekov’s eyes boring into his back, and slows long enough by the lift to wait for him to catch up.

When the lift arrives, they step inside wordlessly and Sulu tucks his hands behind his back and looks up at the ceiling. 

“Chekov,” he begins awkwardly, halting immediately when he hears Chekov mutter back at him something that sounds like “Sulu.” 

He looks up from the floor, and Sulu falls back against the wall of the turbolift, covering his face to muffle an awkward peal of laughter. 

“This is insane,” Chekov remarks politely, but through his fingers Sulu can see him grinning.

What Sulu wants to say to him is that it’s insane that they’ve managed to avoid each other for weeks by mere happenstance, but the doors to the lift open and three chattering members of the science crew file in, and he never even manages to open his mouth. 

Next to him, Chekov groans audibly and leans heavily onto the railing. 

“Soon,” he promises seriously as the lift slows to a halt. Sulu doesn’t understand until he recognizes that they’re on the Engineering deck and Chekov, once again, has been summoned to do post-shift work. 

This time, though the wordless confirmation between them that there is something to discuss between them, it’s his turn to groan.

*

Four days after that, Sulu is still awake, spine askew in a wholly unsuccessful attempt to get comfortable in his bed, which has been perfectly adequate before now. The hour is confirmed by a brief one-eyed squint at the chronometer glowing on the corner, taunting him with a number too close to the time it will screech at him, knocking him out of whatever facsimile of sleep he manages tonight.

To say he hasn’t been sleeping well would be to say that space is an unwelcoming vacuum. Sulu jerks around, stares at his blank ceiling for an eternity compacted into a few more seconds, and tries to reason with whatever part of him is keeping him from sleep. 

There’s work, of course, the unsatisfying daily crush that shows no sign of relenting, even though peace negotiations are nearly complete. His only consolation is that Kirk is as haggard and irritable as he and the rest of the crew feel, all of them eager to complete the delicate talks that threaten to detonate at any time, even so close to their end. It isn’t that Sulu finds them dull or unimportant; it’s that he’s been on point without a break for nearly a month and the constant assault on his stimuli makes it more difficult than ever to relax in the rare and precious time he has off duty.

Then there’s the other thing, the thing that isn’t his duty aboard the _Enterprise_ that’s bothering him. Or maybe it is that neither he nor Chekov has time to see one another because of all the things keeping him tense and awake. Maybe it’s just making it worse. Sulu is beginning to think, with whatever time he can spare from routine helm procedures and extensive lab work, that all he wants is one hour with Chekov to see what it is occupying his what-ifs. Just an hour to see if Chekov is simply a well-suited colleague or his best friend or a future casual lover or the elusive love of his life or _whatever_. 

Sulu punches his pillow. All he wants is one hour so he can stop obsessing about Chekov at night and get some sleep.

*

When Sulu finds himself alone with Chekov yet another two days hence, _actually_ alone and free, he’s certain it’s the result of divine miracle alone.

The Gorlans have left the ship with their treaty in hand and a Federation delegation to help along the peace process, and life aboard the _Enterprise_ has slowly returned to normal as they move farther from Gorlan. Sulu has never been so happy to leave sight of solid ground in favor of a long trip at Warp 5 to a distant starbase. The deckplates feel better humming at warp speed when Sulu leaves the first shift where he’s actually had to do some proper _piloting_ in weeks. 

Chekov catches up with him when he’s on his way to the mess, and they stare at each other for a moment before simultaneously looking down the corridor. Chekov laughs this time and shakes his head.

“I keep expecting a message,” he explains, clearing his throat. “You know, Commander Scott to me, some exploded console in transport.”

Sulu grins at him. “Warp core breach.”

“Klingon warbird at starboard nacelle!” Chekov is grinning now, too, his hands falling loosely at his sides when he moves a little closer, still comfortably distant in a way that Sulu suspects is meant to make him feel secure.

He shrugs casually, “Business as usual.” 

Chekov nods once, firmly, and gives Sulu an intense look that is clearly meant to communicate something more than his single word response: “Yes.” 

Sulu looks past Chekov’s shoulder one last time before he leans close. “I have to go to the botany labs for an hour or so, just to do some observations on a plant we picked up a couple months ago from that moon with the bioluminescent fish.”

The grin on Chekov’s face begins to fade, and Sulu holds up a hand quickly, holding his smile firmly in place, his heart beating to the tempo of the different scenarios running through his head, all the what-ifs there are between he and Chekov: never speaking again or happily ever after, or something different entirely. 

“So, before the Klingons show up and our shields malfunction, do you want to replicate some coffee and go look at the chemical composition of cellular membranes for an hour?”

Chekov’s eyebrows lift to spectacular heights and he starts down the corridor toward the mess without confirming Sulu’s suggestion, as if he won’t waste any of that hard-won time. 

“An hour?” he asks curiously at the replicator, ordering his coffee triple strength and nearly white with milk. 

“Or more,” Sulu answers before slurping coffee from his cup. “You never know.”


End file.
